As English stops being the first language of most London children, is Britain ready for the great integration challenge?

There is a lot of discussion in the media about immigration, but relatively little about integration. Leaving aside how many people should come to the UK, or who they should be, shouldn't we think a bit more about what happens to people once they get here?

In other countries (I'm thinking of Canada in particular) the government and voluntary groups make big efforts to make people feel like they fit in. In the UK we have had a much more laissez-faire approach. By and large it has worked out OK: new migrants developed regional accents, adopted football teams, and felt British.

But it doesn't always work out. Some new arrivals don't feel part of Britain, can't communicate, get stuck in a ghetto, or struggle to get work.

After a decade of faster migration, and with some level of continuing migration in the future, these issues are going to become more acute.

I was set thinking about this because I was having a drink with some teachers the other day. One made the point that in her school roughly two thirds of the children had English as a second language. That prompted me to go and look up the statistics. I think they are quite striking, and tell us something about the scale of the integration challenge we are going to face in the future.

The chart below shows the proportion of pupils with English as an Additional Language (EAL in the jargon). Between 1997 and 2011 the proportion of EAL pupils in state primary schools rose from 7.8% to 16.8%

But the average conceals as much as it reveals, because variation around the country is huge. In Inner London a majority of primary school pupils do not have English as their first language. In two or three years time the same will be true of London as a whole.

In terms of integration, it is worth noting how concentrated areas of EAL pupils are. The range of variation between Local Authorities is huge. That's significant in so far as the children of new migrants would be less likely to feel ghettoised if they were spread evenly across the country. But they really aren't. In Tower Hamlets, for example, only 22% of primary school pupils learned English as their first language.

What does this mean for schools? There are inevitably greater costs in having to employ more language teachers and support teachers to cope with the language gap. In 2008 there were 1,713 specialist teachers of English as an additional language, and a further 1,945 teachers of ethnic minorities.

However, the good news about all this is that children with English as a second language don't seem to be under-performing. Though behind at the end of primary school, on average they have caught up or overtaken by the end of secondary school. As this paper points out:

"there is an initial handicap for Asian and African children relative to White British children in primary school, but this progressively disappears. The early disadvantage is reduced by Key Stage 3 and becomes an ‘advantage’ statistically by KS4: that is, because it is associated with better-performing ethnic groups, it is also associated with better outcomes. Many children of Asian and African origin do not speak English at home and therefore do not do so well in English at primary school; but if their homes are supportive of their education, as is commonly the case, the handicap does not last."

In 2009/10, 55% of pupils with English as their first language got five decent GCSEs including English and Maths, compared to 54% of EAL children.

Pupils with EAL are also less likely to end up in Pupil Referral Units (where pupils get put if they have been excluded). Only 6% of pupils in PRUs didn't have English as their first language. That suggests they were less than half as likely as native English speakers to end up in a PRU.

So schools are doing a good job of helping non-English speakers catch up.

But will children with English as a second language grow up to feel British, to get jobs and to feel included?

I think that is the bigger challenge, and the statistics above make me think it is a likely to be a rapidly growing one.

I think we should aim for people who move to Britain to feel British and fit in. I don't assume that this will happen automatically. In fact second generation migrants can become more divergent from the rest of society than their parents. But I also don't know whether there are any examples of programmes or institutions than can be shown to have helped people integrate.

I can think of some things that seem like they should help. In London there is a long standing tradition of supplementary schools that mix children with others outside their community. I wonder if housing policy (particularly social housing) could be changed to avoid people becoming ghettoised? Initiatives like The Challenge, which aim to mix together school leavers from different walks of life, seem like they could help. On the other hand I wonder about some existing and widespread initiatives like Black History Month. Does this really help? What about other groups? Citizenship lessons were a joke when I was at school (I recall having to copy from out-of-date textbooks predicting victory for the SDP in the 1983 election). Are they better now? I don't know.

What do you think might help people integrate? Leave aside how many people should come here. For the people who have already arrived, do you think government (either local or central) should be trying to do more to help people fit in? Or is it up to us? Do you even agree that we should be aiming for new arrivals to fit in and feel British?